Friday, August 30, 2013

The images I have just uploaded are from our clubs game last Wednesday night - Napoleonics. The game was a 1500pt per side playing 'Fortune & Glory'. Each side fielded three brigades, two of infantry and one of cavalry, all 500pts a brigade. We played the basic set up provided in the rules, for the bigger games each side laid down three pieces of terrain, which is why the table appears a little bare. Once terrain was laid and the scenario picked, objective markers were placed the game was away.

The 'Old' Vs the 'New' title for the post came about when I asked the lads to bring along their own figures instead of using the collection from the club. So Dave and Terry brought along some great old collections - Dave's Russian Army consisted of mostly old Mini figs, which still look quite good on the grand scale, though a little small when facing up against the likes of the tall Elite Miniatures, which Terry provided. But it was good to see new figures on the table and the lads own collections.

Our game started with the Russians on the offensive and the good old French on the defensive....well that was how we started. However by the second turn both the French left and centre were on the attack. The Russians were also on the attack and both sides were to clash in the centre and right flank of each Army.

The French however proved to strong (or my dice rolling was strangely good for a change) and eventually beaten back with heavy losses, leaving the French in command of the battlefield and victors...well at least for another couple of weeks)

Saturday, August 24, 2013

At
the end of each game we play I put out the call of what to play next time
meet...and last Wednesday Brian called for good old North West Frontier, mainly
because he had just received and re-based five companies of good solid Indian
troops. So NWF it was. Our little scenario took us back to the 2nd Afghan War
with the Imperial forces conducting a small raid on a village. Some local
tribesmen, a hardy bunch of Afghan Regulars and a few goats however defended
the village.

The units on each side were broken up in three small
brigades, for ease of movement and control. Each of the two Afghan Infantry
Brigades consisted of a warrior rifleman unit of crack shoots, a unit of tribal
warriors, three companies of regular troops and a section of artillery. Then
the Afghan also had a small brigade of two units of warrior cavalry and a unit
of regular (but poor) mounted troops.

The Imperial forces consisted of an two companies of
elite Highlanders, three Gurkha companies, six companies of loyal Indian
infantry, two sections of artillery and a unit of Bengal Lancers.....nice.

Brian,
Myself and Dave (the Destroyer) contested the Afghans lead by the great Terry,
Stan and Peter. Our rules were Andrew Parr’s - 'Breechloader and Rifle' a variant
of his 'Fortune & Glory' Napoleonic set. The game however played well and
this time the Imperial forces managed to defeat in detail the widely dispersed forces.
Terry having the only real win once his forces finally made it to the
battlefield and overran a section of field guns. The imperial forces lead by
Brian managed to capture most of the objective markers but missed the goats.
Our next game will be Napoleonic’s.

Monday, August 19, 2013

This great little range of ACW figures once were available from Mark Fenlon but were sold on to other manufactures over the last six to eight years and only available at certain times. However now Victor Perry has finally gained the rights to manufacture this great range again but under the new name of 'Adventure Miniatures'. Victor is also a master sculptor and has designed a number of new figures for the range, which he intends to release in the not to distant future. The range, or some of it, can be purchased through Elite Miniatures Australia, who have available a small range of the Cavalry (Union and Confederate) and the very nice Zouaves. Hopefully over the forth coming weeks I will be able to obtain more of this wonderful range.

Sunday, August 18, 2013

Just last Sunday the boys of the 'Lonely Gamers Club' played a great little Samurai Vs Samurai game. There was no real historical scenario troops for either side were just placed down and away we went. Both sides had eight units each of eight stands or basically infantry units of 24 and cavalry units of 12. Originally Leroy had painted and based this armies up for 'Divined Wind' Warhammer Ancients, however as we all know and to Leroy's disappointment the supplement was never released. However we did use a set of rules that Andrew Parr (the writer of Fortune & Glory) has put together. The rules are very similar in mechanics as Fortune & Glory so it was easy for us to pick up and play a nice two hour game with a result at the end.

The plan for both samurai armies was to crush the other - Dave 'The Crusher' and Josh on one side of the river and myself and Stan on the other. Both Stan and I have a military back ground so it was only natural for us to go on the offensive first, while the other formed a defensive posture and braced themselves for the mad rush of cold hard steel.

However as you can probably tell from the images on this post - we ran into a storm of lead ands arrows then Dave's fast charging mounted samurai splashed through the river, shook off a hail of lead shot from my hand gunners and proceeded to lance - cut and smash his way through my troops.

Well this proved to much for my side of the table and my boys ran for the hills. On the other side of the table Stan did not fear much better....trying to storm a river crossing in column proved a little too hard and after repeated charges followed by defeats we through in the towel and to restore our lost honor we decided to commit ritualized suicide - Seppuka.......